My daughter and I both loved that this book took the "superhero" character trope and turned it on its head, and my son was super pleased to read a book that "had all boys as main characters." (Seriously, there's a dearth of boy-lit out there in MG right now.)
Being born with the power to float sounds fantastic -- if you can control it. If you can't, it's terrifying. You'd float away if you weren't anchored to something, all the time. That's the hard truth of life of a RISK -- Reoccurring Incidents of the Strange Kind -- teen.
So what would summer camp look like? Being tied to the dock while others go swimming in a lake? Tied to your bunk while you sleep? Would you wear huge, clunky, heavy shoes? Maybe a super-heavy vest? You'd still have to be strong enough to carry the darn things and they'd make long hikes and nature trails pure misery.
That's what 12-year-old Emerson finds at Camp Outsider. His first friend, Hank, can turn invisible, but it's a pain to disappear when you're trying to chat up a girl. It's a pain in other ways as well for Hank, who embraces his invisibility and has no qualms about running around naked to be totally invisible. Then there's Murphy, a teen time-traveler with his own federal agents / body guards who jump all over him when he gets back from his time travels (to prevent anyone else from taking advantage of them). Gary's known as "Sticky" -- but imagine not being able to choose who or what to stick yourself to, and then being unable to unstick yourself, say, to a rock? Or a tree? For hours, or even days, at a time? Zeke has "sporadic x-ray vision" and naturally bad eyesight to boot. His therapy skunk, Mr. Stink, makes quite an impression.
Slowly the boys realize Murphy's seen his own death. And they've got to find a way to save him. A fantastic boy book!
